Fall Theme Game Stations- 13 in all!

Young kids trust adults despite evidence to the contrary

USA Today

A Study: By Robert Preidt, HealthDay

Very young children are extraordinarily trusting of
what adults tell them, even if there is repeated
evidence to the contrary, finds a new study.

In what may be little surprise to many parents, Unive-
rsity of Virginia researchers found that 3-year-olds
placed more trust in information they are told than
information conveyed to them without words.

In this study, an adult showed children a red and a
yellow cup and then hid a sticker under the red cup.
Some children were told (incorrectly) that the sticker
was under the yellow cup, while other children saw
the adult place an arrow on the yellow cup without
saying anything. The children were told they could
look under one cup and keep the sticker if they
found it. The experiment was repeated eight times
with pairs of different colored cups.

The children who saw the adult place the arrow on
the incorrect cup quickly learned not to trust this
sign. But those who heard the adult say the sticker
was under a certain cup continued to believe that's
where they would find the sticker. Of those 16
children, nine never once found the sticker in eight
tries. (At the end of the game, all the children were
given stickers, whether they found them or not.)

The study appears in the journal Psychological
Science.

"Children have developed a specific bias to believe
what they're told. It's sort of a shortcut to keep them
from having to evaluate what people say. It's useful
because most of the time parents and caregivers tell
children things that they believe to be true," study
author Vikram K. Jaswal said in a journal news
release.

Let's talk about kids health

Last year was the first year of BMI testing done for the 1st grade at the Baker School and at all DY schools.

The results give us a snap shot of the health status of our children at one point in time last year. I personally feel that the testing gives us valuable data in which we should commence discussions about our communities health, our attitudes and what if anything can we do to affect change if we beleive change needs to occur.

Please email this site with your thoughts in an effort to open up some dialog about this important discussion.

Within MA the rate of overweight and obese children is approx. 30% to 33%!

Chocolate Milk Debate Rages On

Can chocolate milk really be healthy? An ad campaign promoting flavored milk in school lunch programs has some parents mooing in discontent.

Read the attached link and perhaps it isn't as bad as we think!